‘No. No, no, no.’
He realized then that, put out a little by the quick switch to a whole different part of his deception, he had shouted his answer. Had that shown he was lying? Perhaps it had.
‘Methinks,’ said R.K. in an audible aside, ‘the gentleman doth protest too much.’
Ghote wondered what on earth he was talking about. What was this ‘methinks’?
‘How much before midnight?’
The snapped question caught him on the hop.
‘I – I am sorry I was not hearing,’ he said, conscious of how much the words might tell against him.
‘Daydreaming, Inspector? Allowing full play to that vivid imagination which enabled you to see events in Inspector Khan’s office, when, so you tell us, you had already left the building?’
Ghote felt, for more moments than he could have wished, baffled. What was he expected to answer? With an effort he pulled himself together.
‘Your question is not entirely clear to me, sir,’ he said. ‘Would you kindly repeat same?’
R.K. gave a great theatrical sigh.
‘Perhaps we had better let it pass. Perhaps instead you could manage to tell us how it was that you came to know the time so accurately when on a dark and cloudy night you stood at the door of Shri Patel’s house and informed his servant so distinctly that it was not yet midnight?’
Ghote’s mind raced, but came up with an instant answer.
‘I had looked at the time in the station before my departure. And I was very well knowing how long it took to foot it from there to my quarter.’
‘In the dark, inspector? In the heavy rain?’
‘At that time the rain was not – ’
He stopped himself. Good God, what had the rain been doing, not at 3 a.m., but just before midnight? It had been pouring hard, of course, not barely drizzling as it had been later.
He swallowed.
‘Yes, Inspector? The rain was not what?’
‘It was not – not my chief concern. I was keen only to get to bed after a long day.’
R.K. paused for a moment at that.
‘Very well,’ he resumed, ‘now tell us about the boat, Inspector. Did you find it or did Mr Kelkar?’
But in the aftermath of his little victory over the rain Ghote was too alert to be caught by this.
‘Boat, sir?’ he said. ‘I am not understanding you.’
‘The boat you used to convey Sergeant Desai’s body to the middle of Lake Helena, Inspector.’
‘But I was not at all doing that.’
But had he been too heated even in that denial? If he had truly tramped back to Shivram Patel’s house before even Desai had gone in to Tiger, would he not have answered the question with more calm? Heated anger was surely a sign of a bad conscience.
He resolved from that moment to keep a stricter guard on himself.
And he succeeded. On occasions that R.K. paused to consult the notes on the table in front of him before starting on some new line of questioning he actually had a moment once or twice to feel a little proud of the calm he was managing to show despite the increasingly sarcastic tone of the examination.
‘And that uniform which was in such a disgusting state of muddiness that a dhobi could recall it after even one year, you persist in saying that it became so merely in making your way across a compound?’
‘That compound was very, very neglected. It was a sea of mud only.’
‘Indeed, Inspector? A sea of mud. What a very imaginative expression. Do you by any chance write poetry?’
‘No, sir.’
‘No? I am surprised. With your gift of invention you could make a great success of it. A greater success than you have had as a police officer, possibly.’
Out of the corner of his eye Ghote saw S.M. Motabhoy, not for the first time, direct a pointed look at Mrs Ahmed, as much as to say Why are you not up on your feet protesting?
‘I mean,’ R.K. continued, ‘do you really intend to tell us, Inspector, that after less than one night’s rain this compound had become – What were the words you chose? Ah, yes, a sea of mud?’
‘The compound had been for some time very neglected.’
‘So you are an expert in the management of a house, besides being one of our most cherished policeman poets?’
‘I am not a poet, sir.’
‘Nor any sort of expert in the management of a large compound?’
‘Not an expert, sir. But I was able to observe that compound for a period of several weeks. The first time I was seeing it even a large bandicoot was running from that place.’
‘Inspector, you excel yourself. A bandicoot? A large bandicoot? Whatever will that imagination of yours produce next?’
Ghote did not see fit to answer.
‘Inspector, I represent the Presiding Officer at this Inquiry. I have asked you a question. Are you declining to reply?’
‘No, sir.’
‘No? Then be so good as to let us hear what answer you have.’
‘To the question What will my imagination produce next?’
But at the Board table S.M. Motabhoy gave a short cough.
‘I do not think, Mr Sankar, we shall be helped by that particular answer from Inspector Ghote.’
‘As you please, sir. Then perhaps the inspector will deign to answer this: did you or did you not, Inspector Ghote, on the night of June the 24th or 25th last year assist A.D.I.G. Kelkar to dispose illegally of the body of one Sergeant Desai? Now, do not be in a hurry to favour us with more of your hot denials. Remember that we are here to elicit the truth. So, did you assist A.D.I.G. Kelkar on that night. Yes or no?’
Inspector Ghote drew in a calm breath.
‘I did not in any way assist the said A.D.I.G. Kelkar,’ he replied.
20
Ghote’s denial, calmly delivered, brought to an end the day’s proceedings. R.K. Sankar flung himself back in his heavy chair as much as to say If you can believe that you will believe there are flowers in the sky. But S.M. Motabhoy, plump behind his moon spectacles, after announcing that next day the sole business would be the Defendant’s Statement added ‘Not that, gentlemen, after the denial we have just listened to we need perhaps hear more from Inspector Ghote, though procedure under the Police Act must of course be rigidly adhered to.’
Ghote fought down a glint of hope then. He had, too, presence of mind enough to thank Mrs Ahmed for having stayed there, ostensibly his defender, before he set off for home.
But he did not get out of the building without experiencing a brief but unsettling incident. He was peering out at the rain, still from time to time wind-whipped to fury, and wondering whether to leave his scooter and endure the long wait for a bus and subsequent buffeting crowdedness when he became aware that someone was standing close behind him.
He turned, a little perturbed by the person’s proximity. And found himself face to face with the taut cheeks and glittering eyes of Inspector Pimputkar.
He would have preferred to say nothing to him. But standing as they were within a few inches of each other, he felt he could not simply move away without speaking.
‘Terrible rains, Inspector,’ he tried.
‘No worse than when you set off for the lake at Vigatpore surely?’ Pimputkar answered.
Ghote was shocked.
He was not even certain whether it was allowable for people on opposite sides in an Inquiry to discuss the case, though he felt that it was wrong. But for Pimputkar simply to take it that what he himself had sworn had not happened had in fact taken place, and that they both knew it, was too much. Far, far too much.
‘Inspector, I do not know what you are meaning,’ he said.
Pimputkar smiled, a little tight smile.
‘Oh, come, Inspector, what is the old saying? “Speak the truth, you are not in court.” ’
Ghote felt a red jet of rage leap up in him.
‘How dare you make such insinuation,’ he shouted. ‘I am telling and telling the truth and it is yo
u who is lying and lying. With your evidence from a known thief only, and your depending and relying on the spite and resentment of a fellow like Shivram Patel.’
Again Pimputkar smiled and a sharp look of malice came into his eyes.
‘But true evidence I was producing, Inspector, except only two-three details, isn’t it? It will be enough to finish you tomorrow.’
‘No,’ Ghote shot back. ‘No, it will not. And you will not, Pimputkar, try as you may. You were not there to hear what S.M. Motabhoy was saying just only now. He was saying we do not need to hear more from Inspector Ghote after the so calm denial we were just listening to, except that full procedures must be adhered to. That is what he was saying.’
And he had the satisfaction of seeing Pimputkar look thoroughly disconcerted.
Pumped high with confidence after the exchange, he strode off through the blinding rain, seized his scooter, started it with a single fine banging kick and roared out into the street with something of the panache of a film hero going to save the heroine from the villain and his full band of goondas.
Nor did he, rather to his own surprise when the burst of rosy confidence had lost its charge, come a cropper on the journey. He had begun to expect fate was bound at least to land him and his machine in some foot-deep puddle, even if he did not skid into the path of an oncoming vehicle. But, except for a delay of a few minutes where a blown down tree had crushed three or four roadside stalls and ended up partly blocking the traffic, no upset occurred. He watched for a little the dozen or so men already busy sawing up this wondrous gift with as many more old crones and scrambling urchins snatching off twigs for firewood, and then managed to wheel his machine round and resume his journey.
The check did, however, give him time finally to sober up and when he reached home he let no hint escape him of the hope he now nurtured. He even deliberately omitted recounting his one or two small triumphs under R.K. Sankar’s needling. When next day he had been properly cleared, if he was, when the Show Cause notice in front of S.M. Motabhoy had not needed to be filled in, then he could ‘remember’ those one or two moments and, husband to wife, boast a little.
He spent the evening pondering the Defendant’s Statement which he would have to make next day. Thinking of the ups and downs of the Inquiry so far, and especially remembering those final, magical words Not that, gentlemen, after the denial we have just listened to we need perhaps hear more from Inspector Ghote – he had surely by-hearted them exactly – he came to the conclusion that his best course was not to attempt at all to counter the points that had been made against him. Instead he would simply state, as clearly and well as he could, that he had in no way assisted Tiger.
Even though he had. Even though he had.
So he took a sheet of scrap paper and a pencil and, not without a good many crossings-out and puttings-back, eventually composed a short and complete denial. He would have liked to have been able to step outside, find somewhere quiet and speak aloud the words he had arrived at. But the rain was still cascading down and the wind battering away, so he had to content himself with a retreat to the bathroom. There, standing barefoot on the chilly concrete floor, he went through a murmured recital. Three times.
But by the end of the evening he felt moderately happy with what he had done.
He would be calm and reasonable. If he could impress the Board, and above all S.M. Motabhoy, with the manner in which he made his denial, he would have done all that he could under the circumstances.
So it was not without an undercurrent of optimism next day that he presented himself, shoes and Sam Browne polished to a new pitch of shininess, uniform pressed to the last inch of crease, in the big room at the Old Secretariat. Even without Mrs Ahmed’s knowledge of courtroom tactics he felt he could survive.
The lashing rain of the early night had died right away before he had left home, and as he stepped into the room he saw through the tall windows that the leaden mass of cloud which had hung over the city with only a single break since the day he had first secured Mrs Ahmed’s services was slowly rolling apart. There were large patches of blue sky and, as he crossed to his hard chair for the last time, a great ray of sunshine poured out to illuminate the green heads of the tossing palms round the Maidan.
He could not help hoping it was a sign.
S.M. Motabhoy entered the room almost immediately, with an air of being quietly pleased both with himself and life. He took his place in the middle of the Board table, glanced at his watch and looked round to make sure everybody was present. They were, even Mrs Ahmed, faithful to the last, hard at work going through a smeary pamphlet of some wronged person’s protest. So, with a rounded cough of warning, S.M. Motabhoy announced that they should begin.
At once R.K. Sankar stood up.
‘Yes, Mr Sankar?’
‘Mr Presiding Officer, you have been good enough to say more than once during the course of the Inquiry that you did not think it a good thing to be bound too closely by the rules and procedures of other places.’
‘Yes, indeed. Such regulations as have been specifically laid down for us we must, of course, adhere to with strict exactitude, but I do not feel we should have been bound by rules applicable elsewhere. I trust you are not going to complain of that?’
‘By no means, Mr Presiding Officer. I would like, in fact, to avail myself of your most praiseworthy, if I may say so, disregard of the legal niceties that so often bedevil proceedings elsewhere.’
‘Yes, Mr Sankar?’ S.M. Motabhoy said, with the barest trace of impatience.
‘Sir, I would like with your permission, to recall Inspector Pimputkar, who has some additional important evidence which I believe the Board should be in possession of before it comes to any decision.’
Ghote felt sweat spring up all over his body, on his chest, blotching in a moment the smartness of his uniform shirt, on his legs, making them seem instantly sore, and all over his face in terrible give-away shining thick beads.
What new evidence had Pimputkar got? What could it be? How could the fellow now, at the last moment, have discovered something that would prove all he had told the Inquiry himself was a concoction of lies? Or would this evidence be false, like his bringing forward Shivram Patel, merely a malignant reaction to those final words of S.M. Motabhoy’s which he himself had repeated to him? But would such a falsity nevertheless convince the Board till this moment, surely, ready to believe in his declared innocence?
S.M. Motabhoy had been, in his usual manner, giving quiet consideration to the request. Now he spoke.
‘Yes, Mr Sankar, so long as you can assure us that this new evidence is likely to be of real assistance to us, by all means introduce it before we ask Inspector Ghote to make his Statement.’
Of course he would agree to R.K.’s request. It was nothing less than just.
‘Thank you, sir,’ R.K. replied. ‘And if I might trespass on your indulgence in one further matter … I believe it would assist us all if I were first to introduce in evidence the Report which the late A.D.I.G. Kelkar made after his Inspection of Vigatpore Police Station.’
Again S.M. Motabhoy considered, though more briefly this time.
‘Very well, Mr Sankar, if you think that would also materially assist.’
‘I do, sir. I have the Report here. It is not an especially long document in itself. Much of the detail is confined to appendices, with which I need not bother you. So, if you would care, sir, to read the main portion to the Inquiry, as you did with the late Mr Kelkar’s confession, that perhaps would be the most convenient way of proceeding.’
‘Very good, Mr Sankar.’
The orderly took the document – it consisted, Ghote saw, of a good many sheets of closely typed paper held together with a tag at the corner – and handed it to S.M. Motabhoy.
‘The main report is contained in Pages One to Four,’ R.K. said.
‘And that is what you wish the Board to hear?’
‘It is.’
‘Very well.’
What was it, what could it be, in Tiger’s report on his Inspection that could somehow have a bearing on his own lies, those lies Tiger had taken such care in his suicide note to allow him to make? And what evidence was Pimputkar going to produce to back up whatever it was?
But, strive as he might, he could pick out no single thing that might seem to contain even the beginnings of a clue. What could there be in the various failings Tiger had so sharply seized on, mostly Inspector Khan’s, some of his own, that could be a give-away point? The unkept-up Bad Character Roll? The missing page from Khan’s Case Diary? That First Information Report which Desai had actually just taken in when Tiger had hurled the inkpot? The missing chair L whatever-it-was?
And why should there be anything, he thought. How could there be really? After all, when Tiger had written his Report there had been nothing that he would have wished more completely to conceal than those few appalling hours when the two of them had first carried the dead weight of Desai’s body out into the rain-battered night, had then borrowed that bicycle, had gone afterwards in their strange procession – watched at some point, yes, by the thief Piraji, all unknowing though they had been – had reached the lakeside, had been through the terrible business of stripping that slippery body as if the fool had actually been going for a midnight swim under the first onslaught of the monsoon and the yet more grim business of pumping water into the inner cavities and had finally tipped their burden from that nearly sinking boat into the black water.
With a pang of sharp sadness he heard S.M. Motabhoy read out finally Tiger’s assessment of his own running of the station. Tiger, keeping to the promise he had made to be strictly correct, had not ignored his faults. I find Ghote to be lacking to a certain extent in good disciplinary qualities in failing to reprimand with sufficient force slackness wherever found and in failing to insist upon unflagging standards of dress, behaviour and duty. But he had ended with clear words of praise. He has brought the station up to a better level in the short time he has been its in-charge and is to be commended.
Under a Monsoon Cloud: an Inspector Ghote Mystery Page 19